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UK festival guide

Boomtown Festival: The City, Its Music and 2027 Dates

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Updated

A five-day camping festival built as a fictional city, where drum and bass, soundsystem culture, techno, punk and live music occupy different districts.

A festival designed to be explored.

Boomtown is built to be wandered through rather than reduced to a running order. Large stages matter, but so do the streets between them, where actors, tiny rooms and pieces of the annual story turn a walk into part of the programme. Participation is optional. You can follow characters and missions or ignore the plot and use the city as a dense map of music.

Boomtown 2027.

Boomtown 2027 runs from Wednesday 11 to Sunday 15 August at Matterley Estate in Hampshire. The edition is called Chapter Six: Wild Style. The dates and chapter title are confirmed, while the artist lineup, district map and detailed transport operation remain pending.

FactCurrent information
Dates11–15 August 2027
LocationMatterley Estate near Winchester, Hampshire
EditionChapter Six: Wild Style
FormatFive-day, over-18 camping festival
2027 lineupNot yet announced
Planning horizonCurrent site permission runs through 2030

The name needs one clarification. Boomtown Festival and Boomtown Fair refer to this Hampshire event. Boom Festival is a separate psychedelic festival in Portugal, and other events use the Boomtown name in Belgium and the United States.

A festival built as a city.

Boomtown divides its site into districts with their own architecture, venues and parts of a connected story. Street performers work between the stages, while opening and closing ceremonies give each annual chapter a beginning and an end. District names and geography can change, so an old map shows one edition only.

Opening ceremony stage and crowd at Boomtown in 2019
The 2019 opening ceremony made the annual chapter visible at arena scale. Street theatre and smaller rooms carry the same fictional city between the large stages. Photograph: Sam Warrenger / TheFestivals.UK, CC BY-SA 4.0.

The design rewards curiosity. Some of the most memorable rooms are deliberately smaller than the headline arenas, and finding one can matter more than standing in front of the biggest stage. This is where the theatre and the music meet: scenic construction gives different sounds a physical address.

What music Boomtown plays.

Boomtown has a strong UK bass and soundsystem foundation. Drum and bass, jungle, dub, reggae and ska run through its history, alongside techno, house, UK garage, hip-hop, punk and live music. Calling it a drum and bass festival captures one important strand and misses the rest.

The Wailers set from 2014 is the most-viewed Boomtown performance video I found, and it points to the reggae and soundsystem roots. Altern 8, filmed by Boiler Room in 2023, is the rave side.

The programme works because those genres are not flattened into one main arena. A small electronic stage can sit beside a street built for performance, while larger spaces carry live bands or soundsystem culture. The exact allocations change with each chapter, so recent recordings are better evidence than an old list of stage names.

From 2009 to Matterley Estate.

Luke "Lak" Mitchell and Chris Rutherford founded Boomtown in 2009. The festival moved to Matterley Estate in 2011 and grew into a temporary city with tens of thousands of visitors. Its official history groups the years through 2019 as Book One, followed by a reset to Chapter One when the festival returned in 2022 after the pandemic interruption.

Industrial Scrapyard stage scenery at Boomtown in 2019
The Scrapyard district in 2019. Boomtown gives genres and venues a physical address, although names and geography change between chapters. Photograph: Sam Warrenger / TheFestivals.UK, CC BY 4.0.

The site now has planning permission through 2030. The approved operation is commonly rounded to about 77,000 people, but that number is a planning ceiling with category-specific allowances, not a verified attendance total for every edition.

Who owns Boomtown.

Boomtown Festival UK Limited is the operating company. In 2022, Live Nation and Gaiety each acquired 18 per cent and SJM acquired 9 per cent, a combined 45 per cent at that time. Later ownership sits through company structures that require current filings to interpret, so it would be inaccurate to describe Boomtown as either wholly independent or wholly owned by one promoter.

Plan your Boomtown trip.

Boomtown is a demanding five-day camping trip as well as a festival. Work out the entry ticket, journey, sleeping setup and realistic daily spend before deciding what the weekend costs.

Budget the whole weekend.

Current 2027 entry prices. General camping is included; booking fees, transport not named in the ticket and optional upgrades are extra.

Ticket optionPrice
Thursday public-transport entryGeneral camping included£315
Thursday standard entryGeneral camping included£370
Wednesday public-transport entryExtra arrival day included£385
Wednesday standard entryExtra arrival day included£440
Eco BondReclaim by returning sorted campsite waste£20

A public-transport entry ticket is valid only when you arrive by an approved public-transport route. At the time checked, Camp Orchid upgrades were £130–£140 and a standard campervan pass was £220.

Choose your route.

  1. Train to Winchester, then shuttle to West Gate

    Winchester station on Google Maps

    Winchester is the nearest main station, about three miles away. Boomtown runs a wheelchair-accessible shuttle; the detailed 2027 timetable is due in July.

  2. Direct National Express festival coach

    Coaches run to the city gates from more than 50 UK departure points. Public-transport ticket holders receive a booking voucher and must reserve the journey by 1 July.

  3. Car, taxi or private drop-off

    Official driving and drop-off instructions

    Buy parking through the ticket account. Taxis and private drop-offs use West Gate; pre-book the return and follow festival road signs rather than local shortcuts.

Coach and shuttle allowance: one soft-sided bag or suitcase up to 20 kg and 75 × 50 × 32 cm, plus three camping items. Trolleys must collapse before boarding.

Where you sleep.

General camping is included. Camp Orchid West is the practical upgrade for public-transport arrivals; Camp Orchid South is closer to car parking. Current pre-pitched options start in the hundreds of pounds, so compare the total per person before booking.

Compare official camping options

Food and drink.

Boomtown has not published 2027 menus. These are previous-edition budgeting benchmarks, not guaranteed prices. Free drinking water is available from site taps and bars; 2027 purchases use the cashless wristband.

Full meal
about £12–£15
Beer or cider
about £7–£7.50
Soft drink
about £3
Selected 2026 meal deal
£6
How Boomtown cashless payments work

Pack for the site, not the forecast.

  • Ticket saved offline and valid photo ID
  • Refillable water bottle, earplugs and power bank
  • Waterproof layer, sun protection and sturdy shoes
  • Medication in original labelled packaging
  • Head torch, tent, sleeping bag and sleeping mat

Leave at home or recheck.

  • Glass bottles, gazebos, barbecues and speakers over 30 cm
  • Spirits or alcohol above the current limit
  • Cooking equipment when a fire restriction is active
  • A trolley that cannot collapse for coach or shuttle travel
  • Luggage you cannot move across steep ground yourself

Current weekend alcohol limit: choose one of 16 × 440 ml beer or cider cans, 18 × 250 ml premixed spirit cans, a 3-litre wine box, or 7 litres of beer or cider in sealed plastic bottles or cans. No spirits, glass or alcohol on re-entry.

Boomtown Festival FAQ.

Where is Boomtown Festival?

Boomtown is held at Matterley Estate near Winchester in Hampshire, England, on the western edge of the South Downs National Park.

When is Boomtown Festival 2027?

Boomtown 2027 runs from 11 to 15 August. The edition is titled Chapter Six: Wild Style.

What music is played at Boomtown?

The programme includes drum and bass, jungle, dub, reggae, ska, techno, house, UK garage, hip-hop, punk and live bands. Bookings and stage allocations change each year.

Is Boomtown a drum and bass festival?

Drum and bass is central to Boomtown, but the festival is not limited to it. Soundsystem music, electronic club styles, punk, hip-hop and live performance all have established places in the programme.

How many people attend Boomtown?

Planning documents allow an operation of roughly 77,000 people, depending on which categories are counted. That ceiling should not be treated as the verified public attendance for every edition.

What is the Boomtown storyline?

Each edition is presented as a chapter in a continuing fictional history. Districts, characters, street performers and ceremonies carry the plot, while visitors can choose how much they want to participate.

Is Boomtown the same as Boom Festival?

No. Boomtown is a multi-genre festival near Winchester in England. Boom Festival is a separate psychedelic festival in Portugal.

Sources.

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